Waking about 3:30am, Clare and I could not get back to sleep. This all began almost 2 years ago when we returned from the Galapagos Island and Peruvian Andes. Then first-year biology professor Delbert Hutchison exclaimed that I shouldn’t have gone to the Galapagos, cradle of evolution, without him. I replied that we should return with Whitman College biology and geology majors in March 2002. Since 1999 I’d been looking forward to hiking in Ecuador’s Avenue of Volcanoes, but a minor coup had made Quito unsafe for foreigners, so we shifted to Cuzco and Machu Picchu at the last moment in March 2000.
Today Delbert, who lived in Ecuador for two years (a score of years ago), with his wife Kathleen and Clare, took the ten students north to Oteval, Ecuador’s ultimate Saturday market. Clare and I talked in the dark quiet of early Saturday morning. Finally, I rose, did some stretching exercises, and chased crackers down with orange juice. Last night I had crammed my old red pack with rain gear, extra clothes, camera, binoculars, energy food, and water. I put on long underwear, quick-dry outerwear, and boots, grabbed my hiking poles, and was out the door of the Hotel Ambassador at 5am.
Our week of hiking in northern Ecuador had included Pululahua Crater (the largest caldera in South America) [after which we encountered the Bill Clinton], Cerro Ilalo (a volcanic dome), Pasachoa’s cloud forest, to the north glacier on Cotopaxi (the world’s highest active volcano at 19815’), to the climbers’ refuge on Chimborazo (its proximity to the equator and its height of 20701’ make its summit the farthest from the Earth’s center), and Cerro Atacazo (an extinct glaciated volcano which rises to 14642’). It’s the wet season in the Andes; on Cotopaxi and Chimborazo we encountered violent weather: thunder and lightning, hail, rain, sleet, and snow. Two afternoons ago we were rewarded with weather clear enough to watch Tungurahua volcano send an ash column high above the small city of Banos. Yesterday on Pasachoa we celebrated noon on the equinox near the equator in Ecuador; there were no shadows! Then, in a violent thunderstorm, rain washed hail to depths of over 3 feet in downtown Quito.
We had not planned to climb Guagua Pinchincha because it is a technical ascent of an active volcano. But yesterday our mountain guide Hector Clarijo mentioned that access to the 15,728’ high volcano was usually possible with a four-wheel-drive. I asked if he was free today; Hector said yes if we left at 5am to get off the volcano before the violent weather typical of wet season afternoons.
We drove south along Quito’s deserted streets. Hector ran some of the abundant red lights. Quito’s former mayor got a kick-back from each traffic light installed, whether it was needed or not! Now he’s a professor at Harvard. We turned west on the road to Lloa, recently paved so the town’s inhabitants can faster escape if a big eruption of Guagua Pinchincha is predicted to be imminent.
The Pinchincha volcanic complex is one of the world’s largest. At the east end are domes, including the Panecillo in Quito where a huge winged statue of the Virgin Mary stands. In the middle is the ancient volcanic crater of Rucu Pinchincha; it towers 7000’ above Quito, which is about 9000’ above sea level (on the east flank of Rucu Pinchincha is a giant sculpture celebrating the 1822 battle in which Ecuador won its independence from Spain.) The west end of the volcanic complex includes the large old caldera and the slightly smaller new crater of Guagua Pinchincha; from here on a clear day in the dry season one can see the Pacific Ocean 100 miles to the west.
The dirt road leading north from Lloa gets narrower and steeper as it climbs higher. In the faint pre-dawn light we passed countless small farm plots on the steep hillsides; despite the owner’s efforts to keep the rich volcanic soil in place, many plots are gullied from the intense down pours of the rainy season. The Andes have experienced hundreds of years of deforestation by Native Americans, Spaniards, and Ecuadoreans. In the 1800s eucalyptus trees were introduced to try to control erosion, especially on the ash-covered flanks of volcanoes. In the 1900s cypress and pines were added to the reforestation program. Above the cloud forest is the paramo, similar to alpine meadows of higher latitudes, but with more shrubs and a greater variety of grasses and wildflowers. Much of the paramo is grazed by cattle with long hair to survive the cool temperatures.
The road to the climber’s refuge has sharp turns, deep ruts, and slippery ash. We caught a glimpse of the sun’s first rays reflecting from Chimborazo’s glaciers 90 miles to the south. A pair of Andean foxes crossed the road, paused to look at us, and disappeared into the paramo. Next to where we parked at the refuge, ice covered the puddles from yesterday’s rainstorm. Above thin snow blanketed the 35˚ slopes of ash and pumice which share the mountaintop with dark cliffs of old lava flows and volcanic breccia. We hurried because the clouds were already starting to swirl around the crater rim, but the hardly more than half an atmosphere slowed our pace. Steep slopes of pumice and cinders are usually difficult to ascend, but this morning they were frozen and covered with a crust of snow.
I was gasping for breath at the caldera rim, but quickly did a northerly photo panorama from the false summit on the east across the caldera to the west peak with a big cross (iron crosses are common on mountains in Latin America). Hector called me down a few steps out of the cold wind to explain the landscape of black rocks and white clouds. The northern part of the caldera has a deep crater which was filled with lots of clouds and some volcanic gasses. As recently as the 1970s the crater floor was flat and smooth except for a tiny hole in the center. During the 1980s and 1990s small phreatic eruptions gradually enlarged the hole. On 7 October 1999 an explosion rocketed a giant mushroom cloud (Ecuadoreans call it a “fungus”) miles above Quito; when geologists next saw the crater the hole was 300’ wide and 300’ deep. A dome, much like the one in Mount St. Helens’ crater, grew at the west end of the crater. Clouds filled the crater today, hiding the dome and its fumaroles.
Hector asked me if I’d rather hike to the crater’s edge, or climb to Guagua Pinchincha’s 15,728’ summit. As there seemed a chance to get a view down into the crater and around to other volcanoes, I chose the climb. We got back on the windy caldera rim and proceeded clockwise on its edge of frozen pumice. The highest plant on the mountain stood alone in the pumice, surviving eruptions and all kinds of weather. Where the pumice ended was an easy scramble over the andesitic volcanic breccia to the false summit. I caught my breath again at above 15,500’, drank some water, and put two pieces of candy in my mouth. Fight the altitude; keep your strength. There to the north across a pumice saddle in the caldera rim was the true summit.
We downclimbed the false summit, the poles interfering. We couldn’t leave the poles because we’d need them on the descent to the refuge by a different route. The caldera gaped to the left, a shorter cliff to the right. The cracks in the rocks were full of snow. Making it down to the saddle, we once again ascended frozen pumice. Occasional clouds flew westward across the summit. It was time to stash our poles when we reached the cliff below the summit.
Hector led, using bare hands to rock climb despite the cold. At one point he and his small pack got stuck in a large crack. I took a slightly different route; my mittens made it hard to use tiny holds, but helped when I jammed my fists into small cracks. The exposure was severe, so I was extra careful with every move. Minutes later we were on the summit! The very top is big enough and flat enough to pitch a few tents, should one be into long-term up-close volcano watching. Cliffs surrounded us, with the deep crater to the west full of clouds; the crate floor with its growing dome is more than 2500’ below the summit! The crater is surrounded by Matterhorn-like peaks formed when ridges were truncated by collapse of the caldera long ago. Close to the east is Rucu Pinchincha, the much older, but only a little lower, volcano. Low black and high snow-covered volcanoes punctuated the clouds to the east and south. The temperature had warmed to near freezing, and the wind became only a breeze, so we talked and ate there in the sun. Hector used his cell phone to report to someone that we were safely on the summit and would descend by a different route.
I wanted to stay “on top of the world” for hours, enjoying the cold clean air, the view, and the conversation, but the clouds could bring lightning and hail with little warning. Downclimbing a summit is generally tougher than the ascent. I took off my gloves to use smaller hand holds; Hector said that my greater height gave me an advantage. Today the descent was easier than climbing up in part because the sun had melted some of the ice and snow from the rocks. At the base of the summit tower we retrieved our poles, which made descending the frozen pumice easy. We spiraled clockwise from the caldera rim, crossing the ridge below the volcanic breccia cliffs of the false summit. On the ridge are a seismograph, photovoltaic panels, batteries, and an antenna. This is part of the prediction system for warning citizens in the vicinity of Quito about a possible violent eruption.
From the seismograph to the refuge our route was through the uppermost vegetation of the paramo. Hector pointed out tiny red flowers on vibrant green cushion plants, which form mounds up to 1’ high and 3’ in diameter. Familiar to me were brilliant red paintbrush and giant purple lupine. We left as Ecuadorian hill stars (hummingbirds) drank nectar from bright orange Chuquirahua flowers. Above the paramo, grey clouds clothed the peaks of Guagua Pinchincha.
R.J. Carson – March 2002